yet
I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed
himself like one of these:
lego
(1SPAI) de humin hoti oude Solomon en pase te doxe autou
periebaleto (3SAMI) os en touton:
.(1Kings 10:5, 6, 7; 2Chronicles 9:4, 5, 6,20, 21, 22;
1Timothy 2:9,10; 1Peter 3:2, 3, 4, 5)
Solomon in all his glory - A man does not get much more
glorious than Solomon, in terms of his material possessions.
Read these representative passages..
In 2
Chronicles 9:22 we read that...
King Solomon became greater
than all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom.
The Queen of Sheba gave an apt commentary on Solomon
in all his glory in 1 Kings 10...
4 When the queen of Sheba
perceived all the wisdom of Solomon, the house that he had
built,
5 the food of his table, the seating of his servants, the
attendance of his waiters and their attire, his cupbearers,
and his stairway by which he went up to the house of the LORD,
there was no more spirit in her.
6 Then she said to the king, "It was a true report which I
heard in my own land about your words and your wisdom.
7 "Nevertheless I did not believe the reports, until I came
and my eyes had seen it. And behold, the half was not told me.
You exceed in wisdom and prosperity the report which I heard.
8 "How blessed are your men, how blessed are these your
servants who stand before you continually and hear your
wisdom.
9 "Blessed be the LORD your God who delighted in you to set
you on the throne of Israel; because the LORD loved Israel
forever, therefore He made you king, to do justice and
righteousness." (Notice what the recognition of Solomon's
glory prompted in the Queen of Sheba? Was it envy? Clearly
not. In fact it prompted in her an anthem of praise to the
glorious God!)
Clothed
(4016)
(periballo from perí = about, round about +
bállo = to cast) means to throw all around and so to array
with clothing.
Jesus
mentions Solomon, which would evoke in the minds of His
Jewish audience a king whose reign was the most resplendent
and magnificent of all the kings of Israel. What could be more
"glorious" than the reign of King Solomon? In short, a lily of
the field, one clothed by God Himself. Surely this comparison
would convince the doubters that God would also clothe them.
><>><>><>
Matt. 6:25-34 THE LESSON OF
BIRDS AND FLOWERS
by F B Meyer
THE Eye,
that is, the pure Intention, of the soul ceases to be single
when it is diverted by the covetous desire to hoard up money.
It may also be diverted by the constant pressure of anxiety.
As, therefore, our Lord has been dealing with avarice, which
is the special temptation of the well-to-do and prosperous, so
now He turns to deal with the special temptation of the poor,
which is anxious care.
Of
course, wealth has its anxieties as well as poverty. The rich
man, whose wealth may be swept away in an hour by a panic on
the Stock Exchange, may toss on a sleepless pillow, whilst the
labouring man, who cannot see beyond the needs of the week,
may be sleeping soundly through the small hours. But the
anxiety of those who, in any event, will always be certain of
being provided with the necessaries of life is surely less
excusable than the care of the poor man, who has no nest-egg
against a rainy day, who may at any moment fall sick or lose
his situation, and who may be condemned to see first his home,
and then his scanty wardrobe, stripped first of little
comforts, and then of necessaries, and, when all is gone, his
wife and children becoming every day paler, thinner, and
hungrier.
It is to
be noticed that our Lord's tone is much gentler and more
tender as He turns to address the poor who toil for their
daily bread, and whose slenderly provided table is often
shadowed with the spectre of anxiety about to-morrow's
provision. In the former paragraph there was a tone of stern
remonstrance as He spoke of the absurdity of setting the heart
on things which the thief might steal and the moth corrupt;
but here there is a touch of tender pity and sympathy as lie
says, three times over, "Don't be anxious." He never forgot
that He was the child of the labouring classes; that His
mother, at His birth, had brought the gift of the poor to the
Temple; and that from boyhood He had been accustomed to the
shifts of poverty. His frequent speech about patching garments
and using old bottleskins, about the price of sparrows, and
the scanty pittance of a labourer's life, indicate that His
mind was habituated to the experiences of the poor. Ever since
lie had left His mother's home, abandoning the trade which had
secured slender provision for Himself and others, He had known
what it was to have no place in which to shelter for the
night, and to subsist on the chance gifts of charity and
friendship.
The
words "take no thought" of the Authorized Version do not
represent the true force of the phrase as used by our Lord. We
are endowed with the faculty of foresight, of scanning the
horizon, of anticipating the lowering storm-clouds, and of
taking in our sails. "He that provideth not for his own," says
the Apostle, "is worse than an unbeliever ", and provision
involves foresight. But there is all the difference in the
world between foresight and foreboding. It is the latter, not
the former, that our Lord chides. A wise man must lay his
carefully considered plans, and work for their accomplishment.
The farmer must sow in the autumn for the coming harvest. The
importer must arrange, months beforehand, for the arrival of
foreign produce at a given time when the home markets will be
ripe for it. The manufacturer is already preparing the
season's goods for next year. But when all has been done that
can be done, our Lord says: "You must leave the results with
God: you have done all that you could do; now leave the
results with your heavenly Father."
The
words which are suggested by the Revised Version, instead of
"Take no thought," are "Be not anxious.'' The Greek word
implies that the mind is divided and broken up from the main
object and purpose of existence by the constant pressure of
foreboding care. As the force of a stream is lessened if the
waters are diverted into two or three channels, so the force
of heart and life dwindle when the perpetual dread of failure
and loss call off the soul from its primary intention and aim.
How can a man do his best work if he is paralyzed by
foreboding as to the contents of to-morrow? When the mind is
stricken with panic, tossed to and fro with distraction, and
filled with pictures of penury and destitution; when every
sight of wife and family only awakens deeper dread of what may
await them; when paragraphs in the daily papers prophesy the
pressure of hard times, how can the soul do its best work? It
is divided, distracted, and torn.
In this
paragraph our Lord is dealing principally with food and
raiment, the simple needs of an agricultural and pastoral
people. And there are myriads around us on whose lips these
questions are perpetual. "What shall we eat? What shall we
drink? Wherewithal shall we be clothed? Clearly we are
creatures of two worlds. Our minds hunger for truth and our
hearts for love. "Man doth not live by bread alone." And there
are anxieties for others, for their clothing in the garments
of purity and holiness, for their feeding on the fare of the
truth of God, and for their housing in the love of God, which
are far more pressing and imperative than the care for their
physical and temporal well-being. All these dividing thoughts
are equally forbidden when our Lord says
"Do not be anxious."
Three
times over we hear this sweet refrain, Be not anxious, Matt.
6:25-30; Be not therefore anxious, Matt. 6:31-33; Be not
therefore anxious, Matt. 6:34.
DO NOT BE ANXIOUS ABOUT
FOOD,
Whether
of the Body, the Mind, or the Heart.
(1)
"The life is more than the food" (Matt. 6:25).
When God
gave life He caused it to be dependent on the sustenance which
is provided from field and orchard. It is by His own
contrivance and ordering that we must be nourished by the
fruits of the soil; and surely He will not be so unreasonable
as to create the need and to contrive the perpetual recurrence
of appetite, and then fail in meeting both. If He has given
life, does not that gift implicate its support? He must have
had a purpose in the donation of life to any one of us, and
surely He will be responsible for the food which is necessary,
if His original purpose is not to be frustrated!
(2)
Are ye not of much more value than the birds of the heaven?
As our
Lord was speaking flocks of pigeons were flying overhead;
swallows were darting in the air for insects; sparrows were
flying, chirping, from stone to stone in search of food. All
this wonderful and multitudinous bird-life, so blithe and
happy, was a matter of constant interest to the child-heart of
Jesus, and seemed to rebuke foreboding fear. These little
feathered creatures do not perform a stroke of work for their
living. They do not provide their food, but only take what the
Creator gives, as He opens His hand to supply their need. That
which He giveth them they gather. You may walk for days
through the forests and find no dead bird. I grant you that
the wild things of the woods do perish at certain seasons, but
before we charge this on any want of care on the part of the
Creator it would have to be shown that the balance of creation
had not been disturbed by human interference. Do we not
prognosticate the advent of a hard winter by the abundance of
berries on the hedges, and is not that the Divine provision
for the birds of the air, who have neither storehouse nor
barn? Surely if our heavenly Father feeds these tiny
creatures, which are the pensioners on His bounty, who can do
nothing to help themselves, He will not be unmindful of His
children! "Your heavenly Father feedeth them, are ye not much
better than they?"
(3)
Besides, "Which of you by being anxious can add one cubit unto
his stature?" or (as the margin suggests) to his age.
Clearly
the Lord is not speaking of our physical stature, for it would
be an unheard-of thing, and one for which none would be
specially solicitous, to add a foot and a half to his stature!
He is evidently alluding to the length of human life, of which
the Psalmist says: "Thou hast made my days as an handbreadth."
After all, the length of our years has been fixed by God; and
we are immortal till our work is done. All our anxiety will
not add an inch or a yard to the path that we are destined to
tread between our cradle and our grave. God has measured it
out with exact precision, and He will supply all our need
until the day's march is ended and the day's labour fulfilled.
DO NOT BE ANXIOUS ABOUT
CLOTHING.
(1)
All the animals have their covering, the lamb its wool, the
kitten its fur, the fledgling its fluffy down, but man is born
naked, and requires clothing for modesty and warmth.
This was
evidently the intention of the Creator, and He has filled the
world with the materials of our supply. May we not hold Him
responsible to meet the needs of His own creation? Did he not
clothe Adam and Eve with the skins of beasts already slain in
sacrifice? Does He not provide for the soul the white and
dazzling raiment if imputed righteousness with which we are
arrayed before all worlds? And will He neglect the body? "The
body is more than raiment." If He bestows the one so curiously
and wondrously wrought, surely He will give the other.
(2)
Besides, look again into nature at the growth of the flowers.
At the
time when Jesus spoke the fields were carpeted with wild
flowers. Palestine in those days was the land, not of milk
only, bespeaking the rich pastures, but of honey, because the
air was redolent with the breath of myriads of wild flowers,
bespangling the pastures, clustering in the hedgerows, and
hiding in the woodland glades. Theirs was as careless a life
as that of the birds. "They toil not, neither do they spin."
For some, no doubt, the exotics of our greenhouses and
nurseries, there must be excessive care in the provision of
greenhouse heat and the experienced skill of the
horticulturist; but the Lord was not alluding to these, but to
the flowers of the grass, which grew amid the wilds of nature
or in the gardens of the poor, and were cut down by the scythe
or gathered to perish quickly in the hot hand of the careless
child. To Him these were exquisitely beautiful. Of the Son of
Man it may be said with peculiar appropriateness that "the
meanest flower that blew awakened thoughts too deep for
tears." The wild flowers of His native land were, in His eyes,
attired in garments more rare and beautiful than the gorgeous
magnificence of Israel's greatest king. "Solomon in all his
glory was not arrayed like one of these." How quietly they
grew, far apart from the clatter of machinery, the throw of
the shuttle, the revolution of the wheel! How modestly and
unobtrusively they concealed themselves from the glare of
publicity in dells and woodland glades! How simple in their
chaste and lovely garb!
What do
they teach? Was not this the lesson of their growth that God
loves the beautiful, and expends thought and skill in its
production? He might have made the world without a daisy, and
human life without childhood. Considerations of stern utility
might have imposed their rigorous law on the creation of all
things visible and invisible; but since the Creator clothes
with beauty the short-lived flowers of the wilds, the
ephemeral insects of a summer day, the shells of the minute
creatures that build up the solid fabric of the rocks by the
countless myriads of their tiny homes, surely this
prodigality, this lavishness, this prolific superabundance of
creativeness, must mean that He can and will withhold no good
thing from them that fear Him, least of all clothes for their
nakedness and warmth.
Of
course we must fulfil our part. We are not to imitate the
careless improvident life of the lower orders of creation. We
must certainly sow and reap and gather into barns; we must
certainly toil if we are men, and spin if we are women; but
when we have done all, we must fall back on the Divine
Providence, believing that it is vain for us to rise up early,
and sit up late, and eat the bread of sorrows, because our God
will give us all we need, even whilst we sleep. He will not
allow His children to starve or go unsheltered, unclothed and
unshod. "Therefore take no thought saying, What shall we eat,
or what shall we drink, or wherewithal shall we be clothed?"
BE NOT
ANXIOUS: it is Heathenism. "After all these things do the
Gentiles seek." The blue waters of the Mediterranean were
almost within sight, reminding the Speaker of the great
nations that lay on their shores, and launched their navies on
their bosom. He knew that whilst some might be feeling after
God, if haply they might find Him, or be found of Him, the
bulk of them had refused to retain Him in their knowledge, and
had exchanged the Creator for the creature. He knew, moreover,
that to most of them there was either no God or that they
deemed Him too far removed from sublunary things to have any
interest in their lives. Of what good, then, was it to pray to
Him? For many the supreme conception was of fate, destiny, or
chance, as the presiding arbiter and ruler of their,
existence.
Amid the
darkness of such conceptions, what could be expected but that
the grim spectre of care should haunt every life, and sit
uninvited at every table. When man has no knowledge of the
Divine Fatherhood, what defence has he against sudden, wild
alarms, or insidious corroding care?
But
those whom our Lord addressed had been taught to regard God as
their Heavenly Father; and to us the revelation has been more
explicit than ever to them. We know that we are sons of God,
begotten unto a living hope, partakers of the Divine Nature,
adopted into the Divine family. We are conscious that the
Spirit of Sonship is in our hearts, witnessing that we have
been born from above. We realize that we are not only sons,
but heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. Our
Father loves us, knows our frame, views us with paternal
pitifulness, and longs to bring us to glory. He has given us
His Son and His Spirit: surely He will not withhold the food
and raiment of our body. He has given the infinitely great:
surely He will not grudge the small. "He that spared not His
own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not
with Him also freely give us all things?"
BE
NOT ANXIOUS: there are other and greater Interests at
Stake. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His
righteousness." It is the great object of God that His
long-expected kingdom should come; that purity as of the dawn
should replace the reign of corruption and night; and that
life should replace death, and love hatred. For this He has
been at work all through the long centuries, nor will He stay
His hand till angel-voices proclaim that the kingdoms of this
world have become the kingdoms of His Christ.
In His
great kindness He has called us in to help Him accomplish His
great purpose, and lays it upon us as a special burden that we
should not rest, nor allow Him to rest, until the kingdom
come, and His will be done on earth as in heaven. For this we
must labour and pray. Be anxious for this, if you will. Lie
awake at night to mourn over the condition of lost souls, if
you can. Expend tears and prayers in untiring supplication for
the lost. Whilst you care for God's concerns God will care for
yours.
The
great contractor who has undertaken a line of railway, or the
construction of a vast reservoir among the hills, knows the
necessity of providing for the well-being of the thousands of
navies engaged with their spades or trowels. If they are to do
work which will not disgrace him, he at least must see that
their physical health and well-being are guaranteed. Is it
likely, then, that God will be less careful and thoughtful of
his own sons, whom He has called into fellowship with Himself?
Does He not know that we shall do our best work when we are
free from anxious care? Is He so unrighteous as to forget us,
who labour day and night for the purpose which lies so near
His heart? It is impossible to suppose it; but as we seek His
kingdom, He will seek our welfare with both hands, earnestly
and carefully. Rest on this promise, which He gave who is
incarnate truth, "All these things shall be added."
BE
NOT ANXIOUS, it will not Rob to-morrow of its Anxiety,
though it will Deprive to-day of its Strength. "Take,
therefore, no thought for the morrow, for the morrow will be
anxious for itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil
thereof." From these words it is clear that every morrow will
have some anxiety, and every day some evil. No sky without
some clouds to fleck its blue, no lot without its crook, no
Paschal lamb without its bitter herbs. We shall never be
totally free from anxiety of one kind or another until we have
passed the gates of pearl.
However
much we worry to-day in the hope of anticipating and
cancelling the worry of to-morrow, we shall not succeed. There
always will be something to cause us annoyance, perplexity,
and chagrin. But as the day, so will the strength be, just
enough, with not one grain to spare. Indeed, the anxiety will
be permitted to drive us to the strong for strength, as a hard
winter will drive even the timid deer down to the homes of
men.
To
worry, therefore, about to-morrow is to overpress the strength
of to-day, which is enough for to-day's burden, but not enough
for to-day's and to-morrow's also. If you try to carry
to-day's burdens by actual endurance, and to-morrow's by
anticipation, what wonder that you break down, aging
prematurely, and sowing plentiful silver among the black locks
of young manhood.
For all
these reasons let us not be anxious. "Be careful for nothing,
but in everything by prayer and supplication, with
thanksgiving; let your requests be made known unto God, and
the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep
your hearts and minds, through Christ Jesus." (F. B. Meyer.
The Directory of the Devout Life.)
